


Christmas in New York

by ElphabaInTheTARDIS



Category: Edgar Allan Poe's Murder Mystery Dinner Party (Web Series)
Genre: Christmas, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-09
Updated: 2017-01-09
Packaged: 2018-09-15 22:34:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9260993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElphabaInTheTARDIS/pseuds/ElphabaInTheTARDIS
Summary: If given the option, H.G. would show her the world.A (late) Poe Party Secret Santa gift written for CaptainSwan618 on tumblr





	

If given the option, H.G. would show her the world.

However, even with his expanded mental capabilities, the help of a time machine, and the knowledge that they had infinite time, he still realized that it would perhaps take him far too long to show Lenore the world.

(He had, of course, realized that with infinite time and research, he could make a list of the most beautiful and breathtaking places to take her to see, and a list of inventions and technologies to show her, and lists of events he must take her to. He had a lot of lists.)

However, this being their first Christmas together, he wanted to make sure the trip he took her on was perfect. So he took to the attic to tinker and do research. He had made a few trips (for research of course) to various times and events. He hadn’t taken Lenore on any of them of course, because this was going to be a _surprise_ and he was sure that if he ruined the surprise then his gift wouldn’t work as planned.

He hoped he was stealthy enough with his work and research that his dear lady ghost wouldn’t notice what he was up to.

But if he knew Lenore, he knew that she was great at figuring out secrets.

*~*~*~*

Lenore knew H.G. was up to something. She also knew that he thought she didn’t know. At first, she decided to let it be. Let him have his secrets. She certainly still had hers.

(Okay. Well, he knew the darkest parts of her life. Her secrets were more so things like how many times she’d read his book. Which like, totally wasn’t a lot of times or anything.)

This, of course, didn’t mean she wasn’t at least curious about what was happening. And it was fun to make him squirm as he tried to talk his way out of whatever he was up to. Playing along was almost _too_ easy.

“Whatcha doing, H.G.?”

Startled, he jumped up, almost throwing the book he was using across the room so it wasn’t in his hands. “Oh, um…ah. Research! You see um the…mechanism that ah…holds the time machine together is m-malfunctioning and ah…it needs further testing so I’ve been trying to find a consistent way to test it with a control test to go to a specific point multiple times…”

Lenore shook her head and floated over to the book he had so quickly thrown. Not subtle at all.

“Cities of Europe,” she read the title out loud, quirking an eyebrow up at her nerdy inventor. “Sounds totally like research on fixing your machine.”

H.G. walked over and snatched the book from her grasp. “That’s…um. That’s part of the research. I need…that is to say, I need to find a sort of control city for the experiment. I need to make sure I am arriving at the same city in the same exact place and time each time to ensure that the machine is functioning properly…”

Lenore interrupted him with a quick peck on the cheek. “Whatever you say, Goggles.” She turned and walked out of the attic, but not before H.G. blushed and got back to his work, now much more determined to keep his surprise for his dear Lenore a secret.

*~*~*~*

As Christmas drew nearer, H.G.’s work on his surprise became more fervent. Lenore knew at this point that he was attempting to plan a surprise for her, but she didn’t want to break his heart by telling him that she knew.

(After all, when you’re a ghost you start to learn how to pick up on things. And maybe eavesdrop without the other one noticing what you’re up to. Not that she would ever use that to spy on what H.G. was working on or anything. She can’t help it if he doesn’t notice her when she pops back up to the attic to get away from Edgar and his constant brooding.)

(Seriously, it was almost _CHRISTMAS_ and the man was still going on about death and other depressing stuff. If it wasn’t for Annabel, she would have threatened him with maybe having a taste of death that he was so obsessed with.)

H.G. was fairly certain that his idea was going to work. He’d had a few close scrapes with Lenore almost figuring out what he was up to. He’d carelessly left some hastily scribbled notes on the table near the couch a few days ago, for example. When Lenore had popped up without warning (something he suspected she did because she thought it was “totes hot when you’re all flustered”) she had grabbed at them before he could awkwardly get them away from her and toss them into a corner, crumpled up and forgotten.

(Well. Not forgotten. He’d retrieved them later after he’d successfully distracted Lenore.)

He had decided after much debate, research, testing, failing, more research and more testing that he would take Lenore to a Christmas celebration in the future. It seemed that in the future people used electronic lighting devices of a multitude of colors to decorate large extravagant trees in the middle of towns and cities. It seemed that people would come to view these large displays, sometimes in extravagant numbers depending on the size of the city. He had taken a test trip to view one of these and had regretted immediately that he had not thought to bring along anything to record its beauty…but then realized that would be best saved for when Lenore saw it for the first time. He could not wait to see the joy and wonder that would come over her face when she saw such a display for the first time. It would be perfect, and for him, seeing her smile was all the present he needed.

(Even though he suspected that one of the packages Lenore had brought home from her “retail therapy” adventure with Annabel was for him. Not that he had peeked or anything. He had more self-restraint than that.)

(Maybe.)

(Well maybe he had peeked a bit, but after it was wrapped and he saw his name on one of the packages with a small heart next to it.)

He had run the calculations several times and tested them even more times than he had checked them. They would land in a time in the distant future where Christmas celebrations had become much more extravagant and they would be in the midst of a large city-wide celebration at Christmas time in London. He would also be able to take Lenore to the different areas he was most familiar with, allowing him to be completely in his element and show off to her a world he felt that he knew so much about.

Yes, this was the perfect plan. He felt confident in his abilities to get them both there at the right time, and felt assured that his tests had all gone to plan. He wasn’t even worried.

Of course, in the years after, Lenore would joke and tell him that maybe he should have been just a bit worried. It was worry, after all, that caused him to be careful. And confidence, that caused him to…make mistakes.

(In his defense, it wasn’t completely his fault.)

*~*~*~*

Lenore was a Lady Ghost and she most definitely did not “bounce” anywhere. But on Christmas of all days, the word that would best describe her movement into the attic to see if H.G. finally would tell her what he had been up to for the past few months was, indeed, “bounced.”

Instead of throwing whatever he was working on across the room (seriously, she loved the man but he was not subtle when it came to hiding things) this time he simply smiled at her when she entered. She felt her stomach do the little flutter it always did when he smiled at her like that (and seriously, she was a ghost. It’s not like she really had a stomach to make that feeling, but as always the rules always seemed to go out the window when H.G. was involved).

“My Dear Lenore,” he began, extending his hand to her. “Would you care to go on a trip with me? As a Christmas gift from me to you?”

Lenore giggled at his formality, the excitement building within her. At least now she would finally get to see what he’d been scheming about in the attic for the past month. “Of course, you nerd.”

Lenore was excited. H.G. hadn’t taken her on a trip anywhere yet despite her subtle (and then later, not-so-subtle) hints that she would love to see the world from a new perspective. He’d always had some excuse about it not being safe or it not being ready or that he didn’t want anything to happen to her. She’d protested, of course, reminding him that the worst thing that could happen to her already had. She’d _died._ She was already totally dead. It wasn’t like anything out there could kill her again or anything.

H.G. pulled Lenore into the machine, and she felt his excitement but also knew that he was nervous. He immediately started pressing buttons and flipping switches and she was content to just watch him work. She could feel his energy sort of radiating off of him, and she readjusted her dress so that her hands had something to do. She was excited, but she wouldn’t lie that she was just a bit nervous. After all, if something _did_ go wrong then she was abandoning poor Annabel with Edgar. And while Edgar would probably totally love that, she would _never_ doom her bestie to a life with _only_ Edgar to deal with. That was too emo and supes depressing.

Lenore, however, had the upmost confidence in her time travelling nerd. To convey that, she leaned over and placed a small kiss on his cheek and reached out and squeezed his hand…

…and in that moment he found himself slightly distracted and didn’t notice that his hand had slipped from the button he needed to press and had landed on a different button.

And off they whisked, through time, to a destination he hadn’t researched or planned for in the slightest, but did not know just yet.

*~*~*~*

When the machine finally stopped, Lenore was almost bouncing again (seriously, as a ghost she needed to learn to be a bit more dignified) with excitement. They had arrived in one piece, the machine was still in one piece and blinking and beeping and doing all of the machine-y things that it had been doing prior to the trip. She excitedly looked to H.G., asking silent permission to be allowed to go outside and see where he had brought them. He nodded towards the door, and she ran outside. He followed, of course, wanting to see her reaction at seeing the scene before them.

When he exited and found himself in the middle of a busy bustling city surrounded by so many bright lights to say he was surprised would be the understatement of the year. He blinked, thinking that he must be seeing things. After all, he had double and triple checked his calculations. They should be in London, at Christmas. This…this was…

“Oh my _God!_ H.G…did you bring me to New York City? At Christmas?”

_Oh no._

No no no no. This was not what he had planned at all.

Lenore turned around to face him, a look of pure wonder and excitement gracing her features, and he felt his anxiety lessen for a second.

“It’s like…always been my dream to see it like this. It’s totally perf.” She walked back towards him and threw her arms around him, enveloping him in a hug which he returned half-heartedly, his brain still running and re-running through the calculations trying to figure out where he had gone wrong. He must have missed something…some variable or factor that he had not accounted for on his tests.

Lenore realized quickly that something was off. H.G. wasn’t doing the humble-but-smug nerdy thing he usually did when one of his experiments worked out. She’d seen that look many times when he’d made one of his various contraptions work (her favorites of course being the different things he had made specifically for her). This, though. This was a look of mild panic that he was trying to mask with a smile. It wasn’t really working.

“H.G.?” She tentatively moved back from the hug, but still kept her arms around him and looked him in the eye, searching for any kind of reassurance or clue as to what was going on.

H.G. pushed his anxiety down, and decided that he was going to make the best of the situation. Lenore was happy, and wasn’t that his entire goal of this experiment? He had wanted to give her the gift of wonder and enjoyment, and the look that had graced her face until he had ruined it by revealing that something was wrong was exactly the type of reaction he had hoped to achieve. Perhaps the miscalculation was a blessing in disguise. He doubted she would have had the same reaction to his original plan, and found himself beginning to second guess that entire plan in the first place.

Before his thoughts could completely fall into their typical anxious spiral, he smiled at Lenore, what he hoped would be a confident smile. “I…wanted to bring you somewhere fantastic and wonderful…I’ve…I’ve been doing research and work for months now to bring you somewhere new and exciting and…and…”

“And you had something else in mind,” she stated matter-of-factly, quirking one eyebrow up at him.

He stumbled, not realizing he had been that easy to read. “No…no. This…this is…good. You are happy, are you not?”

“H.G…” Lenore sighed dramatically (because, after all, one of them had to be dramatic and it might as well be her). “I’m happy when I’m with you.”

(Well that could be filed under “Lamest Things She Has Ever Said ™.”)

H.G. relaxed a bit. She was happy. His relief was almost palpable.

“Come on! I read about this in that book of yours. There should be lights on a giant tree somewhere and we can totally use your cah-mera to take pics and make Annabel supes jealous.”

She grabbed H.G.’s hand and tugged him along eagerly. His previous worries were forgotten, at least for the moment. There would be time later to explain what had happened and time later to try again to make his original plan work. But if he’d learned one thing from his time with Lenore it was that sometimes you don’t need to follow a set plan. Sometimes enjoying the moment and being spontaneous with someone you…loved? Oh he would need to analyze that one later. Yes. Being spontaneous with someone you loved is sometimes the best gift of all.

(Later when they had returned to Edgar’s house he would explain his original plan. She would laugh and tell him he was “totes adorable” for coming up with the entire thing. Their New York City adventures had turned into a night of staring at the lights as the colors danced in the twilight and strolling around what seemed to be called a “central park” in the snow which had escalated quickly into a snowball fight and a snow angel competition. It was Very Dignified and if anyone asked, Lenore had totally _not_ squealed with giggles when H.G. chased her down with a rather large bundle of snow.)

(Both would agree, of course, that it was the perfect Christmas they could have asked for. Sometimes the best gifts are the ones you least expect.)


End file.
